What on earth does this mean . Wouldn't this be extremely confusing, as all other EF and EF-S lenses have their actual focal length marked upon the barrel?

It looks more like they're making future rebels with similar specs to the 60D, which is often considered a "super rebel". This is evidenced by the increased frame rate and the 9 AF point cross type instead of just center cross like the older rebels.

It looks like they Canon is revamping their lineup. The rumored specs for the 70D appear to be a merger between the 7D and XXD line to restore the XXD lineup's position as a semi-pro camera instead of a pro-sumer.

"35mm equivalent focal length marked on the lens focal length of approximately 1.6-fold"

Probably just their way of confusing customers to say that a cropped sensor has a 1.6 multiplier factor.

EDIT:After seeing the pictures of an aerial view, I now see that they changed the On/Off switch to include Video mode. Might warrant some complaints about accidentally switching to video mode when meant to turn it on to take pictures in a rush. But that's only if you're clumsy I guess.